August 2013

09/03/13

Syrian Electronic Army hacks Marines website
Pro-Assad computer hackers broke into the Marine Corps recruiting site on Monday, redirecting visitors to a screen that called President Barack Obama “a traitor who wants to put your lives in danger to rescue al-Qaida insurgents.” The site, marines.com, was tampered with and redirected temporarily to a message from the Syrian Electronic Army, a hacker group that’s claimed responsibility for disrupting the New York Times website, Twitter and other media sites the group sees as sympathetic to Syria’s rebels, but no information was put at risk. The message to the Marine Corps was a plea for Americans to fight alongside the Syrian army and not aide the rebels. (Source)
Stork detained for spying in Egypt
On...

08/26/13

Norfolk deputy charged with soliciting prostitution
Chief Deputy Col. Norman Hughey is on leave after being arrested and charged with solicitation for prostitution. Sheriff Bob McCabe stated that there will be an internal affairs investigation, and until the investigation is complete, no decision will be made about the chief deputy’s employment status with the Norfolk Sheriff’s Office. The 34-year-old veteran of the Norfolk Sheriff’s Office is on indefinite personal leave. (Source)
Man sentenced to five years for beach slaying
On Jan. 14, 24-year-old Divon Tyrek Beckwith-Hall was shot in a Virginia Beach city parking lot at 19th Street after a fight inside an Oceanfront nightclub moved outside. This afternoon a judge sentenced the man responsible,...

08/26/13

CIA files prove America helped Saddam Hussein as he gassed Iran
In 1988, during the days of Iran’s war with Iran, the United States learned through satellite imagery that Iran was about to gain a major strategic advantage by exploiting a hole in Iraqi defenses. U.S. intelligence officials conveyed the location of the Iranian troops to Iraq, fully aware that Hussein’s military would attack with chemical weapons, including sarin, a lethal nerve agent. The attacks where the Iraqis used mustard gas and sarin helped to tilt the war in Iraq’s favor, and they ensured that the Reagan administration’s long-standing policy of securing an Iraqi victory would succeed. They were also the last in a series of chemical strikes stretching back several years that the Reagan...

08/23/13

Sailors accused in rape, abduction
Three sailors stationed in Norfolk have been charged in connection to an abduction and rape in Suffolk. On Monday a female victim reported she was sexually assaulted by three acquaintances while visiting an apartment on College Drive on Aug. 16. As a result of the investigation, three men were charged in connection to the incident. Daniel Keith Saunders, 22, of Norfolk is charged with abduction, extort money or immoral purposes, forcible sodomy and forcible rape. Freddrick Lamar Thompson, 24, of Norfolk is charged with two count of abduction, extort money or immoral purposes, object sexual penetration, forcible sodomy and two counts of rape. Michael Jerame Willis, 20, of Norfolk, is charged with abduction, extort money or immoral purposes, two...

08/22/13

Virginia Beach suspends valet services at Town Center restaurants
On Wednesday the city of Virginia Beach suspended valet service in front of three Town Center restaurants: Ruth’s Chris Steak House, McCormick & Schmick’s and Sonoma Wine Bar & Bistro. The city’s action came a night after Robert Dean, a former councilman and chairman of the Tidewater Libertarian Party, protested the valets by parking in spaces that were designated for their use. Valet parking at the Westin hotel is still operating. (Source)
Aaron Hernandez indicted in death of Odin Lloyd
Former New England Patriot Aaron Hernandez was indicted on a first-degree murder charge Thursday in connection with the death of semi-professional football player Odin Lloyd in June. Hernandez is...

08/19/13

Oscar Pistorius officially charged with murder
Oscar Pistorius, the South African paralypian accused of killing his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp on Valentine’s Day, has been charged with murder and possession of illegal ammunition. Pistorius, 26, confirmed he will arrange his own defence and witnesses for the trial. He was due in court to have his indictment served on what would have been the model’s 30th birthday. (Source)
Lee Thompson Young, star of “The Famous Jett Jackson,” commits suicide
“Rizzoli & Isles” actor Lee Thompson Young, who got his big break in the title of the popular Disney Channel series “The Famous Jett Jackson” when he was just 14, died Monday of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was 29 years...

08/19/13

Two pulled from water at Virginia Beach
Two people were pulled from the water at two different beaches in Virginia Beach Sunday morning. Both are expected to recover after being transported to a local hospital. Virginia Beach dispatch received both calls within a minute of each other around 11:15 a.m., one for a man at the Oceanfront and 8th Street who was boogie boarding and experienced some sort of medical emergency and the other for a man who was surfing near Sandpiper Road in Sandbridge and was struck in the head by his own surfboard and pulled from the water by bystanders. (Source)
Lindsay Lohan does interview with Oprah
Sunday night marked the first time Lindsay Lohan has gone public since her most recent stint in rehab, in her eagerly awaited interview with Oprah...

08/15/13

Chemical weapons investigators to visit Syria
U.N. experts will travel to Syria to investigate claims of chemical weapons used during the country’s civil war after the United Nations and the Syrian government agreed on details of the trip. The U.N. said two weeks ago that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government had agreed to let the inspectors, led by Swedish scientist Ake Sellstrom, travel to three sites where chemical weapons were reported to have been used. Ban’s press office said Wednesday that the Syrian government had now “formally accepted the modalities essential for cooperation to ensure the proper, safe and efficient conduct of the mission.” (Source)
Hannah Anderson’s mother and brother “tortured and killed”...

08/13/13

Man and woman arrested in Norfolk bank robberies
Sandra S. Fenton, 23, of Virginia Beach, and Duane P. Goodson, 33, of Norfolk, have been charged in two recent bank robberies in Norfolk and named as suspects in a third in Chesapeake. About 1 p.m. yesterday a woman entered a SunTrust bank on W. Little Creek Road, implied to a teller that she had a weapon and demanded money. After taking the money, she jumped into a four-door green Lexus driven by a man. Around 4:45 Fenton arrived in Virginia Beach for a probation and parole appointment and was identified as a suspect in the SunTrust robbery and taken to a police station. Police arrested Goodson Monday evening in the 1000 block of Mahone Ave. in Norfolk. They’re also being charged in a July 23 robbery of a PNC Bank on N....

08/12/13

Deadly Iraq bombings target café, school and playground
At least 16 people were killed and 41 wounded on Monday in a suicide bomb attack on a crowded café in Balad, part of the worst wave of violence in Iraq in around five years. Two roadside bombs—one planted near a playground and another near a school—also killed six people and wounded dozens, some of them children, in the town of Muqdadiya. Those blasts underlined a shift in tactics by suspected Islamist militants, who are targeting cafes and recreational areas used by families and children. The latest bloodshed came as al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the weekend bombings across Iraq which killed dozens of people during Eid al-Fitr, the festive end to the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan,...

08/12/13

Nazi war crimes suspect Laszlo Csatary dies
A 98-year-old Hungarian Nazi war crimes suspect, Laszlo Csatary, died in a hospital in Hungary Saturday morning while awaiting trial. At one time he topped the list of most wanted Nazi war crimes suspects and is alleged to have helped deport 15,700 Jews to death camps in World War II. He faced charges relating to his wartime activities in Hungary and Slovakia. He had denied the allegations, saying he was merely an intermediary between Hungarian and German officials and was not involved in war crimes. Csatary had been treated for medical issues and died of pneumonia. (Source)
Missing Rhode Island boy found in good health
Isaiah Perez, a 2-year-old boy who had been kidnapped from a Rhode Island home that was the scene of a double...

08/09/13

Plane crashes into Connecticut houses
A pilot and a 1-year-old child are dead after a small plane crashed into two East Haven, Connecticut houses around 11:25 a.m. The plane was attempting to land at Tweed Airport in rainy conditions. How many people were on the plane is not known, and a 13-year-old remains unaccounted for. The houses hit were both destroyed. (Source)
U.S. justice denies bid for delay on Virginia sodomy law
Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has lost his bid to delay a lower court ruling that struck down the state’s anti-sodomy law while the U.S. Supreme Court considers whether to hear his appeal. Chief Justice John Roberts denied the request on Friday. In March, a divided three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond declared...

08/08/13

Portsmouth mother charged in death of baby boy
Police charged Keisha Christina Holmes, 36, in the asphyxiation death of her infant Wednesday. Police were called around 1 p.m. to Woodstock Street on a report of an infant who was not breathing. Paramedics were unable to revive the baby boy, and he was pronounced dead shortly before 1;30 p.m. His body was taken to the medical examiner to determine his cause of death. Police searched the home and later charged Holmes with first-degree murder. (Source)
Former Dallas Mavericks dancer suspected in shootings
DeSoto Police took 44-year-old Erbie Bowser, a former member of the Dallas Mavericks all-male dance team, into custody Wednesday night in connection with two separate shootings that left four women dead and four children...

08/06/13

Fort Hood trial begins
Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist accused in the 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood targeted fellow soldiers in a planned attack that included stockpiling bullets and researching Taliban leaders calling for jihad, a military prosecutor said today during the opening of the trial. The shooting, which killed 13 people and injured more than 30 others on the Texas military base, remains the deadliest mass shooting ever on a U.S. military installation. Hasan, who is acting as his own attorney, countered prosecutors’ detailed portrait of the attack with a simple statement: “The evidence will clearly show that I am the shooter.” (Source)
Charges dropped against women dropped in abortion case
Today prosecutors dropped charges...

08/06/13

Officials fear liquid explosive threat from al Qaeda
There are growing concerns that an al Qaeda affiliate could use a new generation of liquid explosive, currently undetectable, in a potential attack. Through the TSA has long been concerned about liquid explosives being used in potential devices, the new tactic allows terrorists to dip ordinary clothing into the liquid to make the clothes themselves into explosives once dry. A senior official says the tactic would not be detected by current security measures. The new technique is believed to have been developed by the Yemen-based al Qaeda affiliate al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, home to notorious bomb maker Ibrahim al-Asiri, who is suspected of being the mastermind behind several devious explosive devices including the...

08/05/13

US embassy closures extended
The US says it will keep a number of embassies in north Africa and the Middle East closed until Saturday, due to a possible militant threat. On Sunday 21 US embassies and consulates were closed. According to the state department in Washington, the extended closures were “out of an abundance of caution” and not a reaction to a new threat. (Source)
F-16s collide in midair
Two F-16 Falcon jets collided in mid-air Thursday night 30 miles off Virginia’s coast. The Coast Guard rescued one Air National Guard pilot from the water, and the other was able to make it back to base with a clipped jet wing. The rescued pilot was in good condition and was taken back to Joint Base Andrews in Maryland. The pilots were on a routine training...

08/02/13

Snowden Asylum hits U.S.-Russia Relations
Russia granted asylum to National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden on Thursday, defying and embarrassing an Obama administration that had threatened to scale back diplomatic relations between the two countries. U.S. lawmakers considered this move a slap in the face and called for retaliatory measures from the White House. “We are extremely disappointed that the Russian government would take this step despite our very clear and lawful request” to have him expelled, said White House spokesman Jay Carney. “Mr. Snowden is not a whistleblower—he is accused of leaking classified information.” (Source)
Police arrest three in 2005 Portsmouth homicide
On Thursday police arrested Kevin Deonte Lassiter, 26,...